Wednesday, October 2, 2019

The Wedge - Little Grand Canyon, Utah

On October 2nd, we head to a great little place called "The Wedge," which is, in turn, part of the Little Grand Canyon in Utah. To get there, you go out to the middle of nowhere... and then go about 20 miles further. To place it on a map: it's north of Interstate 70, west of Highway 191/6 and about 20 miles south of the little town of Cleveland. If you prefer... the GPS coordinates are: 39°05'34.9"N 110°45'32.8"W.

This is not the typical place that you would expect to find a relatively large RV (especially with a car in tow), but we have never really been accused of being typical, so off we go!

We head south from our previous night's stay in Helper Utah to Cleveland (Utah that is, not the Ohio one). From there, we get on a series of county roads that soon turn to dirt/gravel dusty bumpiness, but still easily navigable at slower speeds. All in all, decently maintained roads.







Once you get there, you have the choice of ten different camping areas, we chose Wedge Overlook campsite #9, which (if you are lucky) puts you right on the edge overlooking the canyon.



 While there we had a chance to dine at a very exclusive restaurant, with a to die for view (watch your step, I'm not kidding about that). Getting a table there is almost impossible, fortunately we had an "in" with the maitre d. 
Editors Note: Unfortunately the restaurant has since closed, the owners have reportedly left the state.





We spend three days there and manage to squeeze in a nice breakfast of french toast, fruit, bacon and coffee, one morning at our favorite table with the view. Life on the road is difficult, but we're making the best of it ;-)




There are bike trails all over the area, many of which run dizzyingly close to steep drops into the canyon. While Tom took a few of the short cliffside trails, Wendy chose the safer (aka smarter) route that usually ran parallel, just a few feet away. We had a fun, but tiring day on the trails, but were glad to get back to the RV.

Sunset over the Canyon

The place was a photographer's dream, and Tom took full advantage of his time there.


Couldn't get him to leave his camera behind, even on a bike ride!
We finally do have to move on. We'll make one more over night stop in Green River, UT before heading into Colorado. So, of course, we have to take the Green River Cutoff to get there. The Green River Cutoff starts out as a fairly straight, flat gravel road, nothing to it. Then it slowly narrows and curves into a pretty "interesting" drive, not somewhere anyone would expect to see a 33' RV towing a car.

Just a picture to give you an idea of the width of the road and how far ahead you could see
A few obstacles to narrow the road just to challenge the driver
As we finally near Hwy 191, the land flattens out again, and it's easy-peasy. Then Tom observes the train tracks that run parallel to the highway, and says, "Wouldn't it be funny if we had to go under the tracks, and the bridge was too low? Then we'd have to turn around a go back the way we came!"  (Not really funny....We'd had this experience in Washington, when we couldn't get to our campground because the RV was too tall to pass under the railroad trestle at the entrance.)  As we near the tracks, OMG, the road DOES goes under the trestle! We're going to have to go all Chevy Chase and create our own road over the tracks!!! Fortunately, there was enough clearance, and we were able to reach Hwy 191 by squeezing under the trestle.

Looking back west as we left the area, close to Hwy 191
After the narrow, winding road, railroad track scare, and some very unpredictable crosswinds on Hwy 191, we are finally able to relax again when we reach our destination, Green River State Park, UT. 


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